


songs and stars and silence (of loving you)

by CinderAsh



Series: of thunderstorms and stars [3]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Alternate Universe - Human, Cats, Dorks in Love, Established Relationship, I Love You, Kissing, Living Together, M/M, Movie Night, Nonbinary Deceit | Janus Sanders, Nonbinary Dr. Emile Picani, Other, Pets, thunderstorms and stars au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-14
Updated: 2020-06-14
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:34:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24719848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CinderAsh/pseuds/CinderAsh
Summary: Virgil is a poet. He doesn’t think he’s a particularly good one, but his friends and readers seem to, and the collections he releases make more and more money recently. Still, he’s wordless when it comes to Logan Sanders, who seems to be the universe crammed into a human form. Virgil could lose himself in Logan’s eyes––which sparkle whenever he’s happy––or his voice––which carries him away even as it grounds him––or simply in Logan himself, the most wonderful person Virgil has ever met.-A 5+1 fic. Five times Virgil can’t say three small words, and one time he can.A sequel to a storm in your eyes (lightning and dark skies). Best to read that one first.
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders/Logic | Logan Sanders, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders/Deceit | Janus Sanders/Morality | Patton Sanders, Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders/Sleep | Remy Sanders
Series: of thunderstorms and stars [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1763950
Comments: 24
Kudos: 96





	songs and stars and silence (of loving you)

**Author's Note:**

> Virgil’s inability to say “I love you” is based on some of my own experiences; due to a couple of reasons, I associate people saying they love someone out loud with apologies or obligations. I have a hard time saying it to my friends or people I actually care about, while I say it practically automatically to my parents and sister to avoid getting into a fight. Things have gotten better, but sometimes saying stuff like that out loud to people I seriously care about feels like choking. (Writing it is generally fine, which is progress!) Logan and Virgil’s relationship is to try and show how sometimes, saying I love you is insanely hard, harder than you want it to be, and how people sometimes have to express their love for others in different ways, and that is okay. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy! <3

Virgil isn’t great at telling people he loves them.

It’s the cruelest of ironies, he thinks, that he’s a poet. He weaves together words to express himself (and does it well enough that he’s actually started to make quite a bit of money off of his writing) but when he speaks? The sentences seem to lodge in his throat, unable to escape. 

It doesn’t help, either, that love is such an ambiguous concept. It’s supposed to explain everything, love, tell others just how much he appreciates them, but instead it feels vague, definitionless. Just the thought of it is choking. 

He loves Logan Sanders with all his heart. If he could, he’d tell him every day to make sure he knows; each time he tries to explain how he feels, however, he stops on three tiny words; three words that seem intent on stopping him from breathing. 

Logan knows this, knows it the same way Virgil knows that Logan is reluctant to smile openly and finds it difficult to pick gifts for others. He does not resent Virgil for it, (or so he says, at least) but still, there is a certain guilt stemming from his inability to profess his feelings to the most important person in his life. 

But Logan promises it is okay. And Virgil trusts Logan more than anyone else, so he believes him.

–

Saturday is Virgil’s favorite day of the week. This is for many reasons. For one thing, Saturday was the day they had been watching movies together on the couch, the day Logan had gotten a call from their friends and stepped out to take it, the day he had returned to the living room and asked Virgil if he could kiss him, the day they had finally addressed the fact that they were a fair bit more than best friends. Beyond that, though, Saturdays were days of cooking dinner together and dancing to the radio, of movies on the couch and hot chocolate with marshmallow monsters bobbing in their cups, of falling asleep late and waking up to bright sunshine streaming through the windows. 

So it is a Saturday when it happens, with the last dredges of the light from the sunset soaking into the kitchen as they spin around, hand in hand, stomping along to the song on the radio and laughing. 

They twirl apart momentarily, Virgil checking on the pasta and Logan the shrimp, still swaying to the music, orbiting each other even as they are separated. 

And then they are together again, wrapped in each other’s arms, clinging to each other as they laugh and sing and thank their lucky stars the walls and floors of their apartment are thick. 

“ _ I love you _ ,” Logan sings with the music, his voice silver and honey, simultaneously electrifying and soothing. Virgil tries to respond, and the words block up his throat, forcing him silent. Instead, he moves forwards, pulling his boyfriend (Boyfriend! The word still gives him butterflies) into a kiss, trying to communicate everything he feels but can’t say. 

He knows Logan understands somehow, the way he’s always understood Virgil. They talk about it later, after  _ Coraline _ has ended and they’re curled up on the couch together. Logan promises that it is okay, that he understands, that it doesn’t matter if Virgil can’t tell him those three precious words, because he doesn’t have to. 

“It’s okay,” he tells Virgil, in that reassuring way that is all Logan, with words you know are the truth because he said them. “You tell me you love me in so many other ways all the time, whether by your poetry, or making us dinner, or buying that coffee you know I like at the store even though you can’t drink it. I don’t need to hear it to know you love me, thunderstorm.”

“You’re a sap,” he says, but they’re both smiling. 

Logan pulls off his glasses and puts them on the coffee table. “Time for bed, now,” his boyfriend declares, lying back onto the couch, his eyes already closing. “Sleep.”

“I thought it was bad for my back to sleep on the sofa,” Virgil grins, but he takes his hair out of its bun and pulls the blankets over the two of them anyways. 

“Shh,” Logan whispers, and falls asleep moments later. 

He can hear Logan’s heartbeat lying here next to him, a steady beat that seems to sing in Virgil’s ears.  _ I love you, _ he thinks, for every thump.  _ I love you. I love you. I love you.  _

When he wakes up the next morning, the sun shining in through the windows, his boyfriend is still asleep, with his hair a blue, tangled mess. Virgil thinks he’s never been prettier. 

_ I love you _ , he thinks, watching Logan. It’s a start.

–

“Will you do my hair?” Virgil asks, handing Logan his brush. “I’ll do your makeup.” 

“Of course,” he nods, motioning for Virgil to turn to face the mirror. As Logan pulls his hair into sections, Virgil begins to work on his own makeup, careful not to interfere with Logan’s work as he squints at the bathroom mirror. 

“I can’t believe we’re going to a  _ party _ ,” he says, and Logan laughs behind him. “Right? Even just saying it sounds stupid.”

“It’s a holiday party, my dear, and Jan, Pat and Ro are hosting. We are attending to support our friends. No matter how juvenile it seems.”

“Oh, you do not get to pretend to be above this,” Virgil groans, jabbing his eyeliner at Logan’s reflection in the mirror. “Our house looks like Santa Claus threw up on it, and you’ve been baking krumkake, spritz, and ginger snaps for a week.” Logan groans, and Virgil motions towards the fairy lights strung up above the sink, ones he’d put up a week ago. “We both know it’s true. Juvenile, he says. You hypocrite.”

“I mean, you certainly haven’t complained about the mistletoe,” Logan says, and Virgil flips him off in the mirror. “I’m telling the truth, Foley. I always tell the truth. See the necktie? Always serious, me.”

“Sure you are,” he grins, before returning to his eyeshadow. “ _ Super _ serious, Mr. Sherlock Holmes.”

“That was  _ one time- _ ”

“It was four, you absolute nerd.”

“Do not forget I control your hairstyle this evening, Virgil Foley.”

“I’m going to be doing your makeup, Logan Sanders, don’t test me!”

“Truce?” Logan says, after a moment of playful glaring at each other in the mirror. 

“Truce,” Virgil nods, pressing a kiss to his index and middle fingers and tapping Logan’s cheek with them. 

“Do you remember the first time you did my nails?” his boyfriend asks eventually. “When we were in college?”

“That’s when I started doing space-nails for you, right?” Virgil smiles, and Logan waggles his galaxy-themed fingers at him in the mirror. 

“And you found out I’m better at hairstyling than you’ll ever be,” he nods, and Virgil can’t even argue that, because Logan’s right. 

“What’s got you thinking about that?” he asks instead, as he meets Logan’s eyes in the mirror. 

“I was just… It’s funny, the two of us, isn’t it? We danced around each other for five years, V, and then…” He clears his throat, ducking behind Virgil’s head so he can’t see Logan’s face in the mirror anymore, even though the braiding of his hair has ceased. “I was just so stupid.”

“Hey,” Virgil says, frowning. “Hey, L, is touch okay right now?” 

In response, he feels arms wrap around his neck, a face pressed into the back of his shirt. He reaches up to hold one of Logan’s hands, brushing over the back of his palm with his fingertips. 

“What’s going on?” he asks, because he’s seen Logan cry before, of course he has, but this has never come up. “Did something happen, starlight?” 

When his boyfriend doesn’t reply, only tightening his grip on Virgil’s hand, he continues speaking. “I’m just going to… You know I’m not good at talking, at… words, and stuff. But I… Okay. Bandaid, just gotta rip it off.”

He takes a deep breath, and then he speaks. 

“You’re not stupid. You’ve never been stupid in your life, Logan Sanders,” he begins, because that’s a fact. That’s something Virgil knows in his heart and soul and in the very deepest parts of him he has only ever let Logan see, and it’s easy to say. “You’re the smartest person I’ve ever met. I don’t think I’ve told you that, not enough, not as much as I should have. You’re beautiful, L, and not just because you’re so damn pretty. You’re extraordinary, you’re stupefying, you’re… you’re ineffable.”

“Don’t use  _ Good Omens _ against me,” he hears mumbled into his neck, and smiles to himself. 

“It’s true, though,” Virgil whispers, tracing a heart against the back of Logan’s hand. “You can’t be described with words I know, because you’re so far beyond them. You’re so unbelievable, Lo, and I…”

He can’t say what he wants, can’t choke out the words that hide in his throat. Still, Logan looks up, dark eyes poking up from behind Virgil’s shoulder, and he says “Thank you, thunderstorm.”

It’s hard to speak after that, so he just pats Logan’s hand. They return to their individual tasks after a moment, Logan humming to himself as he works on Virgil’s long hair, and he puts the final touches on his makeup as he loses himself to Logan’s voice. They swap after a while, Logan digging around in his makeup bag for his foundation, Virgil searching for a eyeshadow pallet with a specific shade of blue that he  _ knows _ will be perfect.

“I was thinking about when I fell in love with you, really,” Logan finally tells him, when they’re sitting on the floor and Virgil is applying mascara to his partner’s lashes. “Because… well, romantically, at least, it was that day when we danced in the rain, after we’d moved in together. But loving you, as a person, not just as a partner but as a friend? I think it was that night.” 

“Really?” It seems such a small moment in his memories, nail polish and a crown of braids and pizza as  _ Cosmos  _ played in the background. 

“Yes.”

He thinks over that for a minute. “I’ve never really thought about that before,” he says eventually, focusing on the color he’s blending on Logan’s eyelid and not the tears pricking in the corners of his vision.  _ You just put on your makeup, Foley, get ahold of yourself!  _ “So… huh.”

“If you’re not comfortable, there is no need to respond,” Logan reminds him, but Virgil shakes his head, squeezing his eyes shut before opening them again.

“Do you remember that party?”

“The one where you got drunk and called me pretty?”

“When we got milkshakes and fries after, and we watched the stars?” Virgil asks. Logan nods, and he taps him on the nose. “Don’t move, mister, you’re going to make me screw up. Anyways… Well, I think I knew you were really important to me then. Who else would indulge me in my trash eating habits, make constellations with me, and be the sweetest of people all in one night?”

“I’m hardly sweet,” Logan rolls his eyes, but he reaches out to hold Virgil’s free hand anyways. 

“Not always,” he shrugs. “But when it matters, well, you’re one of the best people I’ve ever met.” 

“Even compared to Patton?” 

“Even compared to Patton.”

“Well, now I know you’re a liar,” says Logan, even though he’s grinning. “I love you, V.”

He lets go of Logan’s hand, holding it up with thumb, index and pinkie fingers pointed up, middle and ring fingers pressed against his palm, and moves the hand slightly. Virgil doesn’t speak much ASL, or really any of the language at all, but years ago, his mother had shown him the sign for “I love you”. It is the one he is making now. 

Logan returns the gesture, smiling.

“Why’d that make you cry?” Virgil will ask later, after the party. “Thinking about us.”

“Because I  _ was _ a fool,” Logan shall reply. “Not through any lack of intelligence, not necessarily, but because when we began to pull apart, I let you go.” 

“I was a jealous prick,” he rolls his eyes. “It’s hardly your fault.”

“Still,” Logan sighs, “it wasn’t worth it. I never want to do that again.”

“Then don’t let go,” Virgil tells him, and if they end up holding hands a fair bit more after that, who’s to blame them? 

–

Logan gets sick in February. It’s nothing serious, just a bad cold, but Logan is never one to get sick. That’s Virgil, who sneezes with every change in weather and wears sweaters year round, who has a thermos that smells like chicken broth because he brings it to work and drinks it as he coughs, who carries tissues and bandaids in his pockets  _ just in case _ . So his boyfriend getting sick is a rare thing; his Logan, who brags about his immune system even as he makes sure Virgil drinks water and takes his medicine when he’s sick enough to merit staying home. 

The key difference between the two of them is how  _ hard  _ falling ill always seems to hit Logan, knocking him almost completely out of commission for at least a day. Thus, when he gets sick, Virgil insists on staying home with him. “I can edit from here,” he says when Logan protests, “and you can barely move without collapsing. You need someone to keep an eye on you.”

He’s not wrong, and they both know it, so Logan takes medicine and falls into a restless sleep as Virgil sits in the kitchen, keeping an eye on the broth that’s cooking on the stove as he types away at his computer. 

Logan wakes a few hours later, which Virgil learns because his boyfriend sways as he stands in the doorway to their room, a blanket around his shoulders and glasses missing. “Virgil?” he says, voice slurred. “Where are you?”

He can’t help but laugh. “Right here, dummy. Are you high on cough medicine?” he asks, closing his computer as he stands. “Do you want some soup?”

“Ah,” Logan nods sagely, pulling Virgil into a hug. “There you are. Okay, time to go eat rocks and skip some dinner. I’m gonna give you a marshmallow.”

“Excuse me?” He reaches up to feel Logan’s forehead––hot. “Back to bed with you, I think. Are you thirsty?”

“‘M fine,” he insists, but he’s leaning on Virgil, practically falling asleep standing up. “You’re warm.”

“Yes, so’s the bed. And you need sleep. C’mon,” he says, pulling his sick boyfriend back towards the bedroom.

“Bed’s cold,” Logan whines, and though he’s still holding Virgil, he’s gone as limp as a noodle. “Warm me up, babe.”

“You sound like Remus,” Virgil sighs, maneuvering Logan onto the mattress and gently detaching the arms from around his neck as he pulls the comforter over him. “Sleep.”

“Not like that,” he groans, managing to grab Virgil’s hand before he can fully step away. “‘M cold, you’re warm. Distribution of resources. Cuddling. Win win.”

“Ah yes, because getting sick is totally a win for me.”

“ _ Cuddling. _ ”

He gives in at the sight of the puppy eyes Logan is giving him. “Give me a minute, okay? I’ll be right back.”

“You’d better be,” he says, eyes narrowed. 

When he returns from the kitchen––the broth put in the fridge to reheat later and computer plugged in––Logan’s eyes are closed, but he obviously isn’t asleep, because he grumbles “Get over here, V.”

“Alright,” he laughs as he pulls off his sweatshirt, placing a bottle of water on Logan’s nightstand to replace the empty glass. “Tetchy, much? 

“I’m  _ cold _ ,” he mutters, pulling Virgil into the mass of blankets. 

“I swear, you just like me for my warmth.” Still, Virgil wraps his arms around him, eyes already closing. 

“Correct,” Logan nods. “Also, I love you, but that’s secondary to the heat you provide.”

“Snake,” he says, and falls asleep before he can respond with anything else. 

Later, however, when Logan is asleep again and he’s awake, sitting with his computer in his lap and the brightness as low as possible, he writes. 

_ words I can’t say,  _ he calls the first poem, and underneath,  _ I love you.  _

_ words I want to say _ , he names the second.  _ I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you _ –

They go on for the rest of the page, and he glances over at Logan, and thinks it’s still not enough. 

Virgil is a poet. He doesn’t think he’s a particularly  _ good  _ one, but his friends and readers seem to, and the collections he releases make more and more money recently. Still, he’s wordless when it comes to Logan Sanders, who seems to be the universe crammed into a human form. Virgil could lose himself in Logan’s eyes––which sparkle whenever he’s happy––or his voice––which carries him away even as it grounds him––or simply in Logan himself, the most wonderful person Virgil has ever met. 

He’s just so intelligent, so kind, so… so imperfectly perfect, with dimples when he smiles and the blue hair he’s kept since college and his short temper that always results in some snappy retort whenever Roman annoys him enough, or a yelled “Falsehood!” when Janus says something  _ entirely  _ incorrect. How he can’t cook but is amazing at baking, how he styles Virgil’s hair but consistently leaves his own a mess, how Logan loves his friends with all his heart, and loves  _ Virgil _ , and makes sure he knows it. 

Virgil loves him. He loves Logan, even if he can’t say it. And if he could, if it was easy in the same way it is for his boyfriend, he might never stop telling him, might repeat it like a mantra every day of his life and never make it any less true. 

–

They find her in the rain. 

It is a dark and stormy night – well, dark and stormy mid-afternoon. It’s grey outside, the rain is pouring down in sheets, and the wind tugging at the umbrella in Logan’s hand as his other clutches a canvas bag full of food to his chest. Virgil is carrying groceries too, dodging puddles as he walks and swaying to the music playing on headphones dangling between the two of them. They’re smiling.

It is Virgil that hears it first, and he looks around, shaking his earbud off to hear better. Logan looks over at him, brows furrowed, probably about to speak, but Virgil has already left the safety of the umbrella, crouched over the bags he’s holding as he searches the ground.

The cat is little better than a kitten, pressed into the back of a cardboard box that is sagging in the rain. It mewls, and the sound is like crying, and Virgil’s heart melts. 

Logan reaches him in time to see Virgil tucking a soaked, crying kitten into the canvas bag of groceries, right on top of the vegetables. 

“Oh, brilliant,” he says, but he shifts the umbrella so he can pet the top of the small creature’s head. It blinks at him. 

“It was fate,” Virgil tells him as they keep walking. He’s now thoroughly soaked, hood fallen and hair pressed against his face, but he’s grinning. Logan rolls his eyes.

“Fate, huh?” his boyfriend asks. “I suppose you’re going to want to be keeping it? Although, might I suggest now that we simply take it to the vet. A better home than our apartment complex which, in case you’ve forgotten, doesn’t allow pets.”

“They cannot separate a witch and his familiar,” Virgil says wisely, but the image is rather ruined by how he’s sticking his face into the groceries so the kitten can bat at his nose. 

“Familiar, huh?” Logan sighs, but he’s smiling despite himself. “What’s your familiar’s name, then, O Great Sorcerer? Surely, it has one already.”

“Uh… Oregano,” he blurts out, scanning the groceries. 

Logan can’t hold in his laughter after that. 

Later, they sit on the bathroom floor, Oregano dried off and purring like an engine as she explores their bathroom.

“It’s a girl,” Logan professes, after lifting her up, “and I’d guess at least a few months old. Well, at least we won’t have to buy kitten formula, but young cats eat quite a bit.” 

“How do you know so much about cats?” Virgil asks, as Logan gently places her back onto the towel they’ve spread across the tiles, where she bats at Virgil’s fingers. He’s wearing red nail polish today, decorated with black spots, and Oregano seems to think the tips of his fingers are some sort of amazing toy. 

“I used to work at a shelter in high school, for volunteer hours,” he answers, watching the tiny black kitten. “We used to get boxes of kittens dropped off, and when I’d man the desk, I’d have to take care of them until the professionals had time to take a look at them. Learned a bit.”

“She’s my favorite creature in the whole world,” Virgil coos, as Oregano tries to bite at his fingers. “No, don’t do that, you can’t eat nail polish!”

“Even over me?” Logan raises an eyebrow, but he reaches out to hold Virgil’s free hand in his own, pressing a kiss to his boyfriend’s cheek and pressing their shoulders together as they watch the cat.

Virgil glances at him, eyes narrowed. “...Maybe,” he smirks, and laughs as Logan flicks his forehead. “She doesn’t have a collar, anyways. We could keep her!”

“We will take her to the vet’s tomorrow,” Logan tells him. “I made an appointment while you were taking a shower. Then,  _ if  _ she isn’t microchipped, or doesn’t have other owners, we can think about keeping her. Pets are expensive, Virgil, and you know our landlord doesn’t allow them.”

“Speaking of our landlord,” he begins, and then hesitates. 

“Speaking of our landlord, what?”

“Well,” Virgil says, because  _ rip it off, do it fast, now-  _ “I was thinking… You hate this apartment.”

“I don’t hate it,” Logan protests, helping Oregano climb onto his lap. “Hate is a strong word for my dislike of our… rather awful living space.”

Virgil raises an eyebrow, and he sighs. “Well, yes, I do hate it. Just a bit.”

“I’m not sure there are increments to hatred, honey.”

“How am I supposed to hate much of anything when I’m with you?”

“...Did Roman teach you that?”

“Remus, actually, but not that particular line.”

“I hate you.”

“No you don’t.”

“No, I don’t,” he smiles, resting his head on Logan’s shoulder. “Anyways… What with that promotion you got at the observatory recently, and all the extra money that’s started coming in from my books, maybe it’s time to start looking at a place you might, y’know, not hate.”

“You want to move?” the other asks, expression unreadable. 

“If you’re okay with it,” Virgil answers, staring down at their intertwined hands. “We don’t have to, of course!”

“No,” Logan says, and presses a kiss to Virgil’s head. “That sounds nice, actually. Really nice.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” he nods. “I love you, okay? And I’d love to move somewhere more permanent with you.”

They sit there for a fair bit longer, bound by Oregano sleeping on Logan’s lap. Eventually, Virgil grabs a few pens from the kitchen, and they draw on their limbs together, ink curling across their flesh and linking them with colorful bonds. 

Eventually, Virgil writes  _ I love you _ in his messy scrawl, the ‘v’ straddling the gap between their arms. 

Logan smiles at the sight, and makes the letter into a heart. 

–

“Let’s go out tonight,” Logan says, wrapping his arms around Virgil’s shoulders and leaning over to kiss his cheek. 

“What?” he asks, looking up from the book in his lap to his boyfriend, who stands behind the couch with a backpack over one shoulder and his car keys in his hand. 

“Let me rephrase that.” He drops a bag onto Virgil’s lap, one he  _ recognizes _ , one covered in scratched pins and stained with age. “I have a surprise date planned. I know you’re not a huge fan of surprises, but I also require an air of mystery around this whole thing, so all I can tell you is that we’ll be stopping for food and won’t be in public otherwise.”

“Is this my backpack from college?” 

“Yes,” Logan nods, before rounding the couch to sit beside him. “It’s okay if tonight isn’t a good night for this, V. It’s perfectly fine–”

“No, let’s do it,” Virgil grins, slinging the bag over his shoulder and planting a kiss on Logan’s forehead as he stands. “Let me grab my stuff, and make sure the cats are okay, and then we can bounce.”

He finds Oregano napping on the pillows of their bed, Copper (technically Copernicus, but they only ever call him that when scolding the big orange cat) watching her warily from the end of the bed. Copper is about three times the little black cat’s size, but he’s had a healthy fear of her ever since they met and she smacked him on the nose for hissing at her. 

(Virgil’s very proud of his tiny emo baby and loves his stupid giant son, and although Logan tends to complain about them loudly, Virgil knows he adores both cats.)

He pulls on more appropriate clothes for the chilly night, and, after a moment, grabs his old black beanie, pulling it down to cover the tips of his ears as he jumps off the porch and towards the driveway.

“Took you long enough,” Logan grumbles as he gets into the car, but he’s smiling, and they both hum along to the radio as the world whips past the windows. 

They chat about everything and nothing at all, Logan’s job and Virgil’s writing and their friends. Roman, Janus, and Patton have adopted four dogs by now, and Virgil half suspects they may be planning to open up their own shelter with the help of Emile, who he’s caught researching how to run a nonprofit twice now. 

When they pull into the McDonald’s drive through, Virgil cheers despite himself, because although they both hate the establishment on principle, they both love the french fries. Logan grins over at him, ordering two chocolate milkshakes and, yes, fries, for both of them. 

“Are you taking me  _ stargazing _ ?” Virgil asks, beaming, when they park the car near the top of a mountain that’s almost familiar. 

“Guess,” Logan says, spreading a blanket across the front of their car. 

The sky is awash with stars, clear and bright and beautiful. Virgil only has to search the sky for a moment before he finds the constellations they’d made so long ago, glasses and the outline of a storm in the sky.

And then it clicks. 

“Lo, this is-” he says, turning towards him, but he never finishes his sentence.

The heavens above are beautiful, yes, but still, they’re no match for the cosmos he sees in Logan, the stars and galaxies and universe that make him up. Virgil remembers reading once that everything is essentially made up of stardust––looking at Logan, he believes it. 

“You told me a few years ago that you knew you loved me after that party,” he says, watching Virgil instead of the stars, which seems rather counterproductive. “When we sat and watched the stars together. So, I figured it was in my best interest to do this in the same place.”

Virgil intends to ask what, but his words are whipped away by the sight of the box in Logan’s hands, one too small for anything but…

“Virgil Emo-Nightmare Foley,” (and yes, Virgil laughs a bit at the nickname and cries too, it’s a reminder of a dark house and pounding music and a slight haze as they drove away) “will you marry me?”

“Goddammit, you ruined everything,” Virgil says before he can think, and pulls a similar box out of his sweatshirt pocket. 

Logan laughs at that, and sobs a bit also, and they’re both crying now. “I asked Ro for help,” Virgil explains. “I was going to take you to that park near our college, where we had the snow picnic, remember? Propose there.” He opens the box, wiping at his eyes, suddenly glad he hadn’t had time to put on his makeup when they’d left. “God, Logan Perfect-Hair Sanders, you’re the best thing that ever happened to me. Want to get married, nerd?”

“Still not my middle name,” Logan says, and pulls him into a kiss. “Of course.”

“Well, thank goodness.”

“...Did you seriously call me a nerd in your proposal?”

“Oh, shut up and watch the stars with me, starlight.”

“I love you, thunderstorm.”

Virgil’s crying a bit too much to speak, now, but he takes Logan’s hand and traces a heart against it, before tapping his chest, and when his boyfriend – no,  _ fianc _ _ é _ , and oh hell, he’s going to marry Logan, and he is so, so happy  – pulls him closer, tracing patterns into the sky, he knows Logan understands, just like he always has. 

Logan’s eyes are dark fires, unknown galaxies and worlds beyond Earth. He’s heard tired rants about his own eyes more than once––Logan calling him a thunderstorm and a tempest and a glorious hurricane––and he doesn’t know how to explain how he’s similarly drawn to Logan’s; thrust into adventures and dreams beyond his wildest imagination, while simultaneously the safest he’s ever felt. 

Is that what it is like to love? To see the world not in a new light, but in an entirely new spectrum, both familiar and gloriously different? To risk it all even as you are the safest you’ve ever been? 

Virgil thinks he can accept that. 

–

“Good morning, my dear.”

Virgil groans, pulling the pillow over his head. “Never. Leave me to die, Lo. I’m dead. I’m very dead.”

“I’m quite sure you’re not dead, considering you’re speaking to me,” Logan tells him, throwing open the curtains. Virgil hisses at the sunlight streaming into the room, lazy and bright, creeping even under his makeshift barrier. “Come on, now, up. Don’t make me get the dog.”

“You’d never allow Lily in here, and you know it,” he protests, muffled with his face in the mattress. “You barely ever let  _ Thomas _ have her in his room. And Oregano and Copper support my agenda to sleep forever, so you’re outnumbered.”

Oregano meows from the pillow nearby, licking at Virgil’s hand, and he reaches out to scratch her head blindly. 

“Dad?” he hears from the doorway. 

“Ah, Thomas, there you are,” Logan says, and he can  _ hear  _ the smug satisfaction in his husband’s voice. “Your dad is still asleep, I think. You’d better wake him up.”

“Can I…” -Thomas’ voice drops to a whisper, and Virgil has to fight a smile- “ _ Can I jump on the bed _ ?”

“Just this once,” Logan sighs, and Virgil grunts as a small foot connects with his back, the blankets and pillows bouncing as their son jumps up and down, yelling “Wake up, Dad! Wake up!”

“Oh no!” he yells, sitting up. “The young prince has awakened the dragon from his slumber! Rawr!”

Thomas shrieks, giggling as Virgil grabs him into a hug, grinning as Thomas attempts to pull himself free. “Let me go, Dragon-Witch-Dad!” he says, and Virgil makes a mental note to ask Roman if he’s been reading his manuscripts to Thomas again, because that particular name sounds quite a bit like the fictional character his friend had invented for one of his novels. 

“Oh, fearful dragon,” Logan drawls, monotoned even as he smiles, “how ever shall I convince you to release the young prince?”

“Well,” he says, pausing as he pretends to think about it (and sniffs the air), “I could probably be appeased with… waffles? And bacon?”

Logan nods, and Thomas says “That’s just breakfast, Dad!”

“So it is,” Virgil tells him wisely, “but you should know, Prince, that a dragon is usually only ever mean because it’s hungry.” 

“Really?” 

“Usually, yes,” Logan agrees, reaching over to pluck Thomas out of Virgil’s arms and set him back on the ground. “Speaking of hungry, Lily’s going to want her breakfast soon.”

“Lily!” Thomas gasps, and then runs out of the room, calling for their dog. Judging from the barking Virgil hears from the direction of the kitchen, he finds her. 

“Ready to get up now?” his husband asks, holding out a hand. His ring shines in the sunlight, a silver band engraved with stars and a sparkling blue gem set into the center. It isn’t a diamond (the industry is quite unethical, after all, and they both know it) but Virgil thinks it’s perfect. 

He takes it, pulling himself upright. “I suppose,” he grins, wrapping his arms around him to pull Logan closer. “I love you, Logan Foley-Sanders.”

“I love you too,” Logan says, smiling down at him. 

Virgil knows, logically, that perfection is an impossibility. There are too many flaws in life, too many difficulties and hardships. Still, staring up at his husband, his stars and galaxies and universe itself, listening to their son laugh and dog bark, the scent of breakfast filling the room as they sway in the morning sunlight, Virgil thinks that he may have found it. 

Love is an ambiguous thing. It had been Emile, in the end, who had told Virgil that it’s something you have to make your own definition of, your own explanation for. So Virgil’s definition of love is sunlight in the mornings and constellations in starry skies; it’s waffles and bacon and dancing to the radio; it’s doing each other’s makeup and hair and cuddling when sick; it’s his friends and Lily and Copper and Oregano and Thomas and  _ Logan.  _

Virgil loves with all his heart, even if he sometimes can’t say it. And, in the end, that is enough.

**Author's Note:**

> And I said tired cuddly Logan rights. 
> 
> Come say hi on Tumblr!   
> https://awkwardthings6.tumblr.com/


End file.
